


(To) Taste Their Own Blood

by thecopperkid



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Anal Sex, Friends With Benefits, Illnesses, M/M, Science Fiction, Unsafe Sex, lowkey Mike/Will
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2018-05-21
Packaged: 2019-05-07 15:06:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14673645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecopperkid/pseuds/thecopperkid
Summary: “He’s been blabbering your name since I got him here, Harrington. I almost called the medics, but then I’d have to contact theparents,and…”Steve nods. He knows. Hopper knows he knows.“Well, he only wanted you,” Hopper finishes. Clears his throat.“Oh,” Steve says.*Steve Harrington is just a normal guy.Well, okay, he's a carrier, who's trying really hard not to infect anyone. He knows he fucked up when he wakes from a night of blacking out to find his kitchen trashed, and Billy Hargrove nowhere in sight.





	1. your teeth in my neck

**Author's Note:**

> “How they’d loved to cut themselves on each other, taste their own blood. We were ruinous together, she thinks. But how else can we live, these days, except in the midst of ruin?” -Margaret Atwood

Something’s not right.

Steve feels like he’s somewhere else, not Hawkins. Too warm for late May. He pads blindly into his hallway at 7 A.M. through sticky summer heat, _Narcos_ theme playing butter-smooth from his bedroom, where he’d left Netflix on autoplay as Billy nearly knocked his head off the ground trying to separate him from his skinny jeans.

Steve is surprised to find that the refrigerator light is glowing from the kitchen, reflected in a puddle on the hardwood floor. Odd.

He stands there, hair a tousled mess, last night’s Calvins only half pulled up over his ass, just staring at the placid, leaking liquid that coats the ground. He’s seen a mess like this a handful of times before, and only one of those was Dustin trying to cook them dinner.

The realization hits him slowly, his powers of deduction only operating at a third of their normal speed; Billy _lied_ about using the condom.

Steve had woken up hungover and disoriented, as if from an exorcism. The only drive in his mind, the only thing he’d wanted was to nurse cool water straight out of the faucet. Wash away the thick remnants of hoppy IPA from his tongue. Wanted to crane his neck, in the dark at the bathroom sink, to slurp at it the same way he did when he’d chipped his front tooth sophomore year of high school. (He doesn’t learn. No one’s ever accused Steve of being _smart.)_

But that light, yellowish and unnerving, it stops him in his tracks before he can get to the bathroom. He’s got a bad feeling. Doesn’t need to see much more to know things aren’t okay. He already fucking knows what happened after he was sated with sex and sleep.

Just fucking _great_.

Billy should _know_ Steve is positive. They met during Billy’s first year here. He must’ve heard what happened. Steve’s _told_ him they needed to use a condom. Always. No exceptions.

And, granted. They aren’t that great at _talking,_ it’s never been their strong suit. But Steve thought that he’d been pretty straightforward when he’d pressed the condom to Billy’s bare chest, prefaced things with more or less the same monologue as last time. _Listen. You don’t know where I’ve been. What I’ve_ got. _I don’t even_ want _to think about where your dick’s been. It’s not safe, okay, you have to wear it. Promise me._

He _trusted_ Billy. Steve had watched him roll the condom on between them as Billy sucked down his throat. He’d _smelled_ the artificial latex. That funky plastic, a learned aphrodisiac, a harbinger that Steve was going to get railed out of his mind. When Billy wrestled to flip him over, to take him from behind, Steve had arched his back in impatience to meet Billy’s cock, trained on that goddamn scent and the dull, ecstatic stretch that followed as Billy slipped inside him.

They were so _wasted,_ and. They probably shouldn’t have had sex like that in the first place, but like. They couldn’t stay _away_ from each other. It was like their brains had taken a backseat. Their bodies driving, instead.

In that haze, it’s amazing Steve could make heads or tails of anything, never mind whether or not Billy kept his dick wrapped.

They’ve had sex _before_ and this hadn’t happened, when Billy didn’t try any funny business. It’s just too bad because Steve was always so _careful._ So agonizingly attentive and behaved, even when all he dreamed of doing was coming down Billy Hargrove’s throat. They couldn’t have that luxury.

He wants to scream at Billy. How could he be so stupid? Reckless?

But at the same time, he feels the dread of guilt, hot and emetic, in the pit of his stomach.

Steve let his guard down this once. And Billy’s fucked, now.

Just as he suspected. The kitchen’s raided. There’s trash scattered to the wind, torn right out of the bin under the cabinet, and the refrigerator beeps desperately for attention as if Steve can’t see it’s wide open.

It _smells_ in the room, too, rotten and nauseating and saccharine sweet, like the mess has been sitting out for a few hours. Shards of a jar are shining from the dingy light, and the strawberry jam from it is smattered across the hardwood in a gory looking mess. A gallon of milk lies on its side, leaking its contents all the way to the kitchen island. Brussels sprouts and carrots and tomatoes have come loose from their grocery bags, rolled themselves to a rest in the muck.

Billy was looking for something. That’s clear. And to be fair, Steve’s refrigerator was like, stocked full to impress his mom, to prove he’s been taking care of himself -- so it had to be kind of a feat to find anything in there.

The evidence in question is a sleeve of cling wrap shredded open, lying on the floor, discarded. It drips a little with milk when Steve plucks it between his thumb and index finger to inspect it.

His lip curls as he holds it at an arm’s length. Beige fat remnants have left pasty smears on the packaging. Looks like it was nearly _licked_ _clean._ The bacon that was inside? Unsurprisingly missing. Not a fucking sliver wasted.

He knows Billy ate it raw. The thought turns his stomach over. Meat is good, but it’s no _blood_.

That’s what they say, at least. Steve wouldn’t know. He hasn’t ever gotten the cravings. Hasn’t had to take any pills.

“Jesus Christ,” he breathes, dropping the package in repulsion. It sticks its landing with a wet _plop._

He was saving the meat for when his mom visited for brunch. Ugh. He’s not going to have time to run to the store before she gets there. They were going to make micheladas, fry up bacon and eggs, make their own guac.

At least, during his tirade, Billy had the decency not to knock out the Bloody Mary mix Steve had picked up at Whole Foods, because honestly, Steve needs a _drink_ already.

On his way to get a broom and spray cleaner from the closet, he just sighs.

He supposes he’ll be going vegetarian for breakfast today.


	2. not headstone, but headboard

Steve wasn’t always a carrier. This wasn’t something he’s always had to worry about.

When the sickness broke out, there was, of course, hysteria. It was an old disease, one very few people still had. A freakshow to ogle at. The niche kind of thing covered by VICE News that Steve might watch, detached, on YouTube. 

He’d first heard of it a long time ago, from whisperings about Joyce Byers and her family. That her husband had the misfortune to be born with it. He’d spread it to her, and she’d given it to the boys by giving birth to them. (Sucks to be raised on pills. Changes your whole personality. Maybe that’s why those two were always so spooky. Steve wishes he’d never bullied Jonathan in high school, looking back.)

But then, more people in town started getting really sick. Across the country, too. Massachusetts and Texas and Wyoming.

Paris and Auckland and Bogotá and Oslo and Seoul.

They were going fucking _nuts_. It was this mutant autoimmune condition, that kept splicing and duplicating until it had practically taken on its own lifeforce. The contagion made normal blood production degenerate to the point where the body kicked itself into overdrive to try to rebuild what it was missing.

To be honest, Steve didn’t really _get_ it, what was happening. A little over his head. He was taking a gap year for a reason, okay.

But he knew that once it had you, it acted _fast._ Overnight, even.

There were fevers because of it. Wild delirium. The human body rationalizing, pleading to get what it needs. And it wasn’t above doing some pretty _wicked_ shit to get whatever that may be. In this case, blood.

_Brainwashing._ Steve had seen it happen too many times. It was terrifying, what the sickness could convince the body to do. Like a perverse magic trick, the human body has strange methods of persuasion when it’s desperate. A mirage of water in the dry heat of the desert.

By middle school, the sickness wasn’t dormant anymore like it had been when Steve was a child. Things had picked up pace until ignorance wasn’t an option. Mainstream media had to address it head on.

People in Hawkins mostly referred to it as exactly that, “ _it,_ ” like they were afraid if they came up with a name, it would hear their gossip, and find them, too.

_No cure._ _Hematophagy. Transmitted through bodily fluids._ The headlines online and banners scrolling across CNN were haunting, like Steve was stuck in some B-rated sci-fi apocalypse film. He thought he’d gladly take _Sharknado_ over this, though.

His mother cried into the sleeve of her cashmere sweater at the doctor’s office when he was diagnosed, Yves Saint Laurent mascara in ugly squiggling half circles under her eyes. It was so scary and confusing. So _embarrassing,_ Steve thought _._ The Harringtons never expected it would happen to _them._ To their only son. But this sickness, it didn’t discriminate.

That was a double whammy for Mrs. Harrington, what an absolute shit day -- she found out all in one go that not only was her baby Steve sexually active, but he’d mysteriously turned up _sick._

She wasn’t a religious woman, but that night from the upstairs bathroom bordering the master bedroom, Steve overheard her praying, praying to _something,_ he can’t be sure that she even knew whom or what it was she was reaching out to.

One time on the board in history class, Steve’s teacher wrote the Marx quote “ _religion is the opiate of the masses.”_ (It resonated with him, was about the only thing he’d retained from the duration of high school, besides how to roll a cross joint, or the quickest way to make a girl come on his fingers.)

From how his mom was acting, he buys that. Thinks that’s how a lot of people came to terms with the fact that their daughters and boyfriends and fathers and coaches and bosses were falling ill.

Mr. Harrington tried his best to keep his wife calm about Steve’s diagnosis, but there’s only so much one can do for a grieving mother. It was, to her, as bad as if Steve had already died. At least some part of him had.

_Lucky,_ Dr. Owens had told him with a pitying smile. His voice sounded far away, not real, as Steve sat on the crinkly examination table, staring blank at the crow perched in the tree outside the window.

_This gene you have, there are others with it._ Crow opened its beak, cawed.

_A carrier -- which explains the lack of symptoms._ Crow flapped its wings.

_Condoms, from now on._ Flap, flap.

After all, Steve might not have even known he’d gotten it at first, if it wasn’t for the whole _Nancy_ thing.

A nightmare. Paramedics said she’d almost _killed_ her little brother if they’d gotten there just ten minutes too late. Maybe that was just some big macho talk from the ambulance driver, trying to come off as a hero, but it doesn’t seem so farfetched to Steve. Mike was never quite the same. And, God, _Karen._ She took it worst of all.

It wasn’t Nancy’s fault. The whole body persuasion thing. They say pheromones make sources of blood smell like your favorite meal before you were infected. Steve thinks that maybe the day Nancy got sick, Mike smelled to her like strawberry milkshakes and a chicken Caesar salad. Extra croutons. Side of onion rings. Honey mustard on the side.

(He wonders vaguely what it would smell like to him. Green enchiladas. Beer. Mashed potatoes from KFC.)

Steve thinks Mike’s skin still looks pallid, drained of blood. Thinks that’s the reason he was so unfriendly to Steve when he used to drop Dustin at their house. That he blames Steve for the all those transfusions he’d had to undergo. Weeks spent at the hospital to get his frail body in working order.

Will Byers sat at his side the whole time with a full set of colored pencils, drawing Mike pictures, with that simultaneously sunny and sad smile never letting up. Maybe because he was one of the few who understood this unique kind of suffering.

Steve won’t ever get over that. He tried to visit Mike once, a few days in, but it was too much. It was so sterile and stifling in there. He’d passed the window of room 230 while Mike’s eyes were still closed. Stopped in the hallway, watching, like time stood still. Saw the way this was hurting Will, the way he was holding tight to Mike’s limp hand. Steve couldn’t do it, he couldn’t go in. He fucking _ran._

It’s better between them now. But Steve never got to express how truly sorry he was.

The Harringtons only got Steve tested in the first place because of what happened with the Wheelers. As if there were still any debate on whether Steve had it. As if there were anyone else that could have passed it to Nancy. She was a _virgin_ before Steve.

Where he’d contracted the disease, now, _that_ was a conundrum, more interesting.

Steve only _occasionally_ had sex without protection in the past. Had _never_ done intravenous drugs. So, this far along, Steve would likely never know for sure where his came from, unless he could find this girl and _smell_ her. Because everybody knows, the person who infects you always smells distinctly like _home._ It won’t ever go away.

Maybe it was some girl he fucked at Tina’s party. He can’t remember. That one girl, she wasn’t even from Hawkins. He was barely 17 and horny and didn’t think this was a real _thing_ he had to worry about. Thought that he was covered as he rutted against her on the bathroom counter, when she whispered in his ear, _I have an IUD, you can just come inside._

This whole ordeal might be worse than getting a girl knocked up, though.

He doesn’t think too much about it.

It doesn’t really bother him.

Nothing he could do about it _now,_ anyway.

As time went on, the disease became normalized. Not totally transparent; the visibility that existed for other illnesses didn’t always extend to this one, largely because of the sexual nature through which it was usually passed. Taboo. Steve didn’t _tell_ people he had it if he could avoid it. Not a great conversation starter. But it wasn’t a life sentence any longer -- not like those old horror stories Hollywood would tell you.

Hollywood. Ugh. The connection was there. People _wanted_ to use that word, the one Steve hated. _Vampire._ He’d almost slapped Dustin silly for saying it, for joking about it sort of callously, like his own best friend Will wasn’t infected, too.

_You seen me turn into a fucking bat, Dustin? Do I have fucking fangs?_

No. It was just a thing people had. Like cystic fibrosis, or diabetes. All about managing it, learning to live with it.

Like, _yeah,_ some of the infecteds were sucking blood from other humans, but. Other than that?

Normal.

There were fundraisers and support groups. Prevention pamphlets in the school nurse’s office. Boxes Steve had to mark at the doctor’s.

Positive, yes. He etches a check mark in the provided area. Almost tears a hole in the paper with the dull lead of the pencil.

It was all old news, now. Just part of life.

*

He knows what he has to do. Billy is too proud to do it himself.

It used to be that you’d need a physician to prescribe the pills, but lucky for Billy, the demand got too high. Low doses over the counter, these days. Easy, with generic no-name brands, at Walmart and CVS. One bottle held the infected over for about two months.

Shakira’s warbling over the speakers when Steve gets there, losing her glimmer in the folksy local pharmacy. It’s uncomfortably familiar here, but it’s the closest place to the Hargrove house. That’s why Steve picked it.

Under the irritating buzz of fluorescent lights, Steve tries to look inconspicuous as he peruses different vitamins, supplements. The _déjà vu_ is overwhelming. He squats down, squinting, pretends like he doesn’t know exactly what he’s looking for.

Like he doesn’t know right where they’ll be.

325 milligrams. Right on the end of the aisle, next to ferrous sulfate. Yellow cap. $6.50.

What’s worse, there are like, four moms in here wandering the aisles, and it feels like they’re all staring at him. He feels like such a shithead. His paranoia suggests it’s because they _know,_ know these pills aren’t for him, that he’s gone and fucked someone else’s life up; his ego, on the other hand, tells him they’re checking him out, because come on, he’s _cute,_ moms _dig_ his preppy, good-guy ass.

A bouncing little boy with curly blonde hair tugs away from his mother, steps in front of him, obscuring the neatly-arranged bottles. He points finger guns at Steve. _Pew pew._ Steve meekly makes the gesture back.

It’s that fucking babysitter vibe. Kids can _sense_ it.

Moms sense something, too, evidently, from the way his pretty young mother blushes and frantically apologizes as she shoos her boy away from Steve, as if he was bothering him.

And okay, actually. She’s definitely checking Steve out as she walks away, right? Letting her kid waddle precariously toward the toy section, in favor of looking back to make sure Steve’s inspecting her ass. Which he absolutely, shamelessly _is_. He’s forgotten why he’s _here._ Like, her ass, it’s so tight and round, perfect in yoga pants -- he’s hypnotized. Steadily getting hard.

Thing is, Dr. Owens left something out when he briefed Steve. Or maybe Steve had gone into shock and hadn’t heard him. Either way, it didn’t take long to piece it together.

Carriers like Steve? They _did_ have one symptom.

A fucking ravenous sexual appetite like the other infecteds, and a blend of potent pheromones given off at nearly all times that attract prospective partners. The sickness, spreading itself. More mind control.

That was likely why Billy kept coming back to Steve. He was powerless to the delicious smell of him. Turned animalistic around him, had to _take_ him. Steve liked being taken, particularly by Billy.

_Billy._ Fuck. His stomach sinks again when it hits him. When he thinks of how far he could have gotten, what he could have gotten himself into--

No. He doesn’t want to think about it, he's not going to jump to conclusions, just has to get these damn pills.

He waits until the mom’s turned the corner before he scoops up what he came for.

It’s not the first time Steve’s gone to fetch the meds. He used to snag them for Nancy. There was something ritual about it, like guiltily picking up Plan B for an array of different girls in high school. _Before_ he was infected, of course.

The thirst came on like an period for Nancy, so Steve was kind of accustomed to the whole thing. He’d been there dozens of times. Knew what to do.

He always figured she had run out of pills the moment she began suggesting that they grill up the ribeyes his dad had in the refrigerator, like she’d ever cared to eat red meat in the past. He used to have to really hassle her to get her to eat a damn burger on the 4th of July. Not anymore, she _changed._

He’d reach for his keys just before the bargaining started if he timed it right. She’d be like, _No, you know what? That’s okay, we don’t even have to cook it. I think a small bite would be okay for now. I just want a little taste, Steve, come on. Steve,_ please. _I think that would be okay. Don’t you think?_

No.

He doesn’t _think._

Nance, you’re _sick._ Nance, in pink Aerie panties, braless under an old _Harrington_ basketball jersey, sucking ground beef from its styrofoam on the cool tile of the kitchen floor. You’re _sick._ Nance, Nance, full glass of water. Open your mouth. You _have_ to. Hey, the whole thing. They _said._

Steve is a _good boyfriend._ At least, he tried to make himself into one.

He never thought he’d be a regular at a _pharmacy._ But it’s old hat now.

So why can’t he evade this feeling, this weight on his chest, like the room is caving in on him, like everyone’s looking at him, like he can’t fucking _breathe?_

He needs to get the _fuck_ out of here.

*

He calls Max after the pharmacy.

Or, rather, he’s been texting Billy all morning to no fucking avail, demands Max’s number from Dustin before he’s done flipping his mom’s over hard eggs around 8, _finally_ gets a response near 12, and calls Max frantically with the phone nestled between his shoulder and ear when he’s already outside the Hargrove house, cracking his knuckles nervously in the front seat of his BMW.

Pick up pick up pick _up._

She doesn’t answer, but he sees her angry eyebrows peeking up through the screen door, spying at him from where he’s parked on the other side of the curb.

He hasn’t wasted his time leaving his car two streets over like he usually would. This feels more urgent.

He nearly misses being hit by a whisper-quiet Prius with how quickly he darts across the road, up the front walkway.

Max pushes open the screen, props it open with her hip, like, “ _What?_ ”

She looks, well.

Different. Since he last saw her.

Freshman year of high school has done something to her. Steve thinks “matured her,” but that’s not really it. She sucks on a shrinking red lollipop. Has all sorts of rainbow colored beads on the wrist that holds it to her glittering glossy lips. She’s wearing a blue floral dress with black Vans. When she quirks her eyebrow, Steve notices she plucks them now.

A phase, probably.

Her elbows are still ruddy, though, scabbed crusty brown and maroon in a few places, maybe road burn. _Zoomer._ Some things never change.

Steve pulls a face. Doesn’t move from the cheery welcome mat. He doesn’t _feel_ very welcomed. “Has he come home yet? Is he here?”

“Never is,” she says plainly, like she doesn’t get why Steve would check here, first, of all places. She uses her lollipop to gesture to the lack of a gaudy Camaro in the driveway. “ _See?_ You try texting him?”

“I wouldn’t _be_ here if he’d been answering his phone,” he says. “Please tell me he’s just ignoring me. That he’s texted you today.”

Max shrugs. It makes her red hair ripple around freckled shoulders. She checks her own phone, thumbing through with a chewed-up nail. Flashes the screen at him as proof. “Nothing. We don’t really _text._ Why’re you tweaking? He’s probably still blacked out in some chick’s bed right now.”

Some _“chick.”_ She’s said that on purpose. Like Max doesn’t _know._ Of course she knows that Billy’s fucking Steve. Not that they fuck _exclusively,_ or anything, but. It’s kind of a _thing,_ and. They’re _maybe_ a little obvious about it. And she’s _smart._ She picks up on a lot more than Billy gives her credit for. _He_ treats her like she’s an idiot.

For one thing, she definitely knows Steve tests positive at Dr. Owens’ office.

That’s apparently more than he can say for Billy, given the nature of Steve’s visit to the Hargrove house on this fine summer’s day. Birds tittering merrily in the budding trees of their backyard. A neighbor’s sprinkler tick-tick-ticking. Pills rattling in the pocket of Steve’s shorts, feeling heavier than their actual weight.

“What’re you doing, anyway, coming around here?” Max asks, scrunching up her face. Her voice is a little lower now. Secret. She glances around the neighborhood. “Are you crazy? Parking out front? It’s just me and mom today, but Neil would _flip_ if he knew.”

And doesn’t Steve fucking know _that._

“I wouldn’t be here,” he says again. “Unless it was fucking necessary. _Believe_ me.”

She looks at him like she doesn’t, though.

“Max, honey? Who’s there?” Susan’s voice calls from where Steve knows the kitchen is.

The kitchen, where he and Billy almost got caught trading handjobs a few months back when Max’s field hockey game ended sooner than expected. Where Steve had escaped through the back window before Neil could see his face -- _ninja_ \-- but Billy didn’t fare as well. A sort of sacrifice, protecting Steve.

He’d caught absolute _hell_ for it. Neil knew Billy was hiding something -- if he’d been with a girl, getting jerked off, he wouldn’t be sneaking her through the back. He’d get her to her feet, help her get covered up before his dad saw. _Oh, hi. Anna was just leaving._ Walk her out front to her car. Kiss her one more time, push her up against the driver’s side door. Slip his hand up the back of her dress to squeeze her ass, even though, or maybe _because_ he knows his dad is peering, suspicious, distrustful through the blinds.

Billy would wear it like a badge of honor. Player. Masculine. _Straight._

Max whips her curtain of red hair in Susan’s direction, and it startles Steve. She shouts back, “It’s just a kid from school. One sec.”

Steve shuffles his feet, itching to leave. Doesn’t know why she’s lied. Susan knows about Steve, too. She smiles at him when he passes by her elliptical at the gym, looking sorry for him. Sometimes Billy even brings over little Ziplock bags of cookies she’s made. _Susan asked me to give you these. It’s whatever. You don’t gotta eat them, or nothin’._

“Can you just tell him I stopped by? That I’m -- that I’m looking for him, okay. It’s really fucking important.”

Max regards him, puts the lolli in her mouth thoughtfully. Eyes mean, like her brother. _Step-_ brother. The stick flails about when she speaks next. It reminds Steve of Billy’s cigarettes, the way he’s always got one dangling from his lips. Her mouth’s full of gooey cherry saliva, though.

“What do you think I am, his secretary? Not my fault you can’t keep a hold on your _boyfriend._ ”

Steve puffs out his cheeks and lets out a breath he’d been holding seemingly since he woke up this morning. He wants to tell her she’s been no fucking help, but she's a kid, and with Susan just in the other room, he bites it back.

For Susan. For the prospect of more raspberry shortbread thumbprints.

“Just _tell_ him, please? Would it kill you?” Steve says, already making to leave. “And he’s not my boyfriend. Jesus. Nice to see you, _too,_ by the way.”

As he turns down the steps, he sees her smile from the doorway. She slurps her candy as he crosses the road, and lets the screen door snap shut with a creak, but she stays there watching.

She likes Steve. Likes when he gives the attitude right back to her. He knows she does, or she wouldn’t even give him _this_ much to work with.

Maybe Steve likes her, too.


	3. love like an ache in the jaw

“Is this Steve Harrington?”

He’d know that voice anywhere. Hopper. This isn’t who he’d been hoping for, but somehow he isn’t surprised. Just dreading what comes next.

Steve’s already baked when he gets the call. He’s been driving around for hours, smoking joints with shaking hands and checking all Billy’s stupid haunts.

His car’s not outside the gym. Not at the quarry. Not the liquor store twenty minutes south of Hawkins, that one that doesn’t card them. Not at the mall or Taco Bell or that restaurant where all the waitresses wear booty shorts and titty shirts.

“Y-yeah, hi,” Steve breathes into the phone, heart racing. It feels like his heartbeat is in his ears. He takes one final hit and stubs out the roach on a Starbucks lid in his cup holder. “Um. Hopper?”

The chief takes a deep breath and sighs through his nose for a long moment, a tired, frustrated sound. Steve waits. Lets out smoke toward his cracked window. Stares at rushing traffic and neon signs from where he’s parked in a gas station parking lot, little white flies fluttering frenzied around the streetlights.

“You’re over 18, right?”

“Yes,” he hears himself say, feeling anxious. What does that have to do with anything?

“Good, so you’ll be playing guardian tonight,” Hopper says. “Look, kid I think you should come down. It would be easier to explain things if you did.”

“Come down,” repeats Steve. “Like, down to the station? Am I in trouble or something?”

The _station._ Christ.

“No, no,” he says. It’s hard to read his tone. Steve doesn’t have any relationship with him. Just knows that he’s Jane’s dad, and remembers him sometimes coming in to Hawkins High to break up fights when things got really bad between Billy and whoever had rubbed him the wrong way that day. “That’s not it. I just -- think you should come here. As soon as you can.”

For some reason, Steve’s almost disappointed that he’s not the one in trouble. That would be simpler to stomach.

“Shit, okay,” he says, already starting the ignition. Hopper hangs up without another word.

Steve doesn’t remember the drive there.

The station emits a warm luminescence from inside, and the ombre of the navy and orange sunset backlights it, the combination making it look eerily sleepy and defunct. Like no one should even _be_ there right now. There’s only a few cars in the lot since it’s late on a Sunday night, just a couple officers who have to hold down the fort.

Because really, nothing happens in a small town like Hawkins, Indiana.

This is stupid. Steve’s _baked._ He can’t even drive past a cop car on a burn cruise without his heart jumping out of his fucking chest, and now? His head’s buzzy and his ideas are roaming and he can’t stay on one train of thought but here he is about to hand himself over to Hopper for this _idiot_ who couldn’t just wear a condom like Steve told him.

He stays huddled in the driver’s seat staring at his bloodshot eyes in the mirror, peeling his lower lids back so he can squirt, like, ten thousand eye drops in to relieve the redness.

Steve knows he needs to sober himself up so he doesn’t have a panic attack in the station. He slaps his cheek a few times, as if that’s ever worked for before, the way he used to do when he was a freshman and his older friends dropped him off at his house, blazed as fuck, from a party.

It’s useless. He still _feels_ it. But he has to go in now. Before he pussies out.

The station’s deadly quiet up front when he tiptoes his way in. No one’s working the reception desk, although the little green lamp on the table is left on. Laptop propped open. Like maybe who’d ever had been there had snuck out of work in a hurry.

When Hopper emerges from the hall, having heard Steve walk in, he looks surly as usual. The dark circles are nothing new, neither is the displeased frown cinching his eyebrows. But it’s a different flavor this time, seems like it carries more weight. He gestures Steve forward and Steve follows, obedient.

“So where’s the party?” Hopper asks without looking at Steve, no doubt smelling the sillage of weed on him.

Steve feels a shock run through his system. His brain is stuttering to come up with an excuse, but Hopper looks over his shoulder as they turn a corner down the hall.

“Oh, _relax,_ I’m not getting on your case about a little pot,” he says. He comes to a stop in front of a door and Steve almost walks right into his back. Hopper faces Steve, lowers his voice. “Anyway. Your _friend’s_ the troublemaker. Won’t stop demanding that he see you. So. Here we are.”

A little further down the hall, Steve can see one of those one-way windows. Steve can only see that the room’s brightly lit, can’t see the table he knows Billy’s probably slumped over on. He doesn’t want to see, if he’s honest.

“Billy asked for me?”

Hopper huffs. “Yeah. _Asked,_ asked real fucking nice. Threw a fucking chair at me and broke it.”

“What _happened?_ ” Steve asks, incredulous. “How’d you find him?”

“Got a call about a kid on drugs, down by the playground on Lock Street,” Hopper says. He looks wary. “Lady on the phone sounded _real_ worried. Should have known it was Hargrove. She’d thought he’d been going through withdrawals, but. I think we both know what’s going on. Keeps saying he’s thirsty. I don’t think it’s water he needs.”

Steve just. Doesn’t say anything.

“He’s been blabbering your name since I got him here, Harrington. I almost called the medics, but then I’d have to contact the _parents,_ and…”

Steve nods. He knows. Hopper knows he knows.

“Well, he only wanted you,” Hopper finishes. Clears his throat.

“Oh,” Steve says.

“I wouldn’t usually ask you to come here,” he says. “But Hargrove’s really out of it. I’ve never seen him like this before.”

Hopper _knows_ Billy. The Hargroves have been in the state for just about two years and they already have a history with the police department. Not only because of Billy’s behavior at school, but also the type of dispute that happened after Max’s field hockey match that night.

Hopper’s intuitive. He’s not just going to throw Billy to the wolves like that.

Rather, to the _wolf,_ singular.

Steve feels like he should say something. Confess to Hopper that Billy’s sick, that Steve _made_ him sick. That what Billy needs isn’t him, not really, it’s a fucking doctor. But he knows Billy better than that, and maybe Hopper does too.

Hopper tries to do the _right_ thing.

“I was hoping you could talk to him,” Hopper continues. He points in the direction of the interrogation room. “He’s all restrained, so. Go on.”

Steve follows dumbly. He’s _afraid._ He can’t gain composure.

Besides, he knows he’ll have trouble keeping it once he sees what he’s done to Billy.

Hopper unlocks the door for him and leaves them alone, making it very clear before Steve enters that he’s going to be _right outside the whole time, in case the kid gets ballsy._

 _The kid_ is a sweaty goddamn mess. Billy’s got his head thrown back looking at the stark ceiling and his curls are matted and tangled, hanging limp down the White Stripes shirt Steve took off of him last night. The shirt’s black, but even still Steve can tell it’s _filthy_ , sort of brownish and tattered in a few places, a little wet around the collar and armpits from perspiration.

He looks like _shit._ He’s got bruises that weren’t there when Billy was fucking him not fifteen hours ago, and his chin’s stained a faint orange around the stubble. Purple bags hang under his eyes, making him look more gaunt than he really is. He’s handcuffed behind his back. Weakness is completely evident in the way he holds himself. Surrendered. Just miserable.

Steve edges in and gingerly sits across from him, and Billy rises, sinisterly slow, to meet him. When they lock eyes, Steve notices Billy’s whites are red, the pupils blown, lashes damp. He’s definitely been crying.

And despite all this, the sickness has Steve’s _dick hard._ Billy’s always smelled delicious to Steve since he’s been sick, but the pheromones Billy’s giving off, now? It’s his body trying to lure Steve in, infect him. Spread. A little late for that.

The scent is way different than before. More complicated and musky and heady and savory like _meat,_ so fucking _good_ that Steve just wants to _taste_ him and--

“Harrington?” Billy asks deliriously.

It doesn’t look like anyone’s really home in there. His forehead shines in the bright overheads. Curls are pasted to his temples, looking dark brown because they’re so soaked with sweat.

He’s got the fever. Steve’s only seen someone this sick when they aren’t on the pills, and haven’t tried to replace blood in _hours._ He can’t imagine the agony Billy’s in. He’s heard it’s supposed to be like a terrible fusion of starving, and withdrawing from heroin. He must’ve been resisting the urges.

That’s almost more amazing to Steve than what he’d thought. He had been dreading finding Billy, had thought he’d have fucked twenty girls in town by now and got them all infected. Had thought maybe, it’d be easy, and he’d find him huddled in the bathtub at the Hargrove house with the neighbor’s golden retriever slain over the floor. Bloody smears on the tile. Max with a mop. _Don’t worry, I won’t tell your dad._

Somehow, it’s worse, worse that he hasn’t let the animal instincts take over. He’s a shell of a person.

“Yeah, fuck,” Steve says, scooting forward so the chair makes a gross _squawk_ against the concrete floor. He wants to reach out, take Billy’s hand and sooth his fingers over his skin, but the handcuffs make that impossible. “Fuck, Billy, it’s me.”

“What _took_ you so long,” he croaks. “I think I’m dying. Am I gonna die, Harrington?”

And if Steve was feeling guilty before, that fucking _breaks_ him. He sounds pathetic, a word Steve would never have thought to apply to Billy Hargrove in the past.

“Hey -- you aren’t _dying,_ ” says Steve, and he does what he wants to do anyway, he stretches a hand out on the table as some sort of peace offering, something to stabilize Billy. “You’re really sick right now. But it won’t feel like this forever. You have to let us help you, that’s all.”

But it doesn’t even seem like Billy can even process that. He just rocks his shoulders back and forth against the top of the chair, like his skin’s on fire and he’s trying to put it out.

“What’s happening to me? Why’m I dying?” he’s babbling. It’s painful just watching him. The way his face looks, so fucked up and checked out. It’s difficult for Steve to see him like this, so decidedly _not_ Billy Hargrove, so feeble and crazed and uncertain. “You gotta make it stop, please. I’m so thirsty, I feel like I’m burning up, okay. You gotta help me. You have to give me something.”

“I will, I’m gonna make this right,” Steve says, because he wants to, because it’s what he should say, even though he can’t fix it entirely. “I just need you to do something for me, but you aren’t gonna like it. But you have to say you’ll try.”

Billy sits bolt upright suddenly, eyes frantic. “Harrington, you _hafta_ get me outta here. I’ll suck your fucking _cock,_ please--”

“Jesus, no,” Steve says, looking over his shoulder at the one-way window in a futile attempt to see if Hopper’s listening. He just sees himself, of course, and a ghoulish version of Billy squirming in the background. “I’m gonna help you, okay? You just have to calm down. You just have to try.”

“I’ll literally blow you right here, right now, in front of the old man, I don’t give a fuck,” he says in earnest. He laughs hysterically when he brings up Hopper, licks his tongue over his stained teeth, _wicked._ “Really will, honest. I don’t give a fuck. I’m just so _thirsty._ I’m _dying._ Come on, Stevie, come over here and I’ll suck it _so_ good for you, I can’t even fight you off, ‘cause my wrists are all bound up, you can just take what you want from me, just _use_ me--”

The bargaining. It’s scary.

“ _Billy._ No one’s sucking anyone’s anything.”

“You _never_ let me suck your cock,” Billy growls, still struggling like he’s going to make any headway with those chains on his wrists. And it’s true, Steve won’t ever let him. Because he was afraid of _this_ happening. This exact thing. Of course he fucking wanted to shove his cock down Billy’s throat. But there was no safe way to do it. “Why won’t you let me suck it? What? Are you afraid of being _gay?_ I got fuckin’ news for you. You’re gay _. Ho. Ly. Shit._ You’re so gay, dude, you’re in denial but you love guys, you love _dick_ \--”

Why are Steve’s cheeks so _hot_ right now? Billy doesn’t usually get under his skin anymore, but Steve’s _embarrassed,_ now.

“ _Hey,_ ” he says, loud and mean and curt. Billy’s acting insane. Saying shit he _never_ would. He sounds worse than drunk. “You don’t know what you’re saying, alright? Stop it. I’m trying to help you.”

Steve fumbles in his pocket, thankful he didn’t leave the pills with Max like he’d briefly considered. He procures the bottle and sets it on the table.

Billy looks betrayed when he sees the yellow cap.

“No way, no fuckin’ doctors,” he spits. At least _some_ part of Billy that Steve recognizes is still in there. Pride. “You _know_ that. You promised. You _promised._ You promised me, a long time ago.”

“Look, no doctors, I swear on my life,” Steve says. He shakes the pills, and they rattle back. “Just me. Just these. It’s like a pain killer, right? Like Ibuprofen. It goes down easy.”

“No,” wails Billy. “No, I don’t want them. You can’t make me.”

It’s so different than before, when they would fuck and Billy would take total control of Steve. Now, Billy’s begging, pleading with him. Trying to distract him. Pathetic. Steve feels sick.

“I can’t make you, you’re right _,_ ” Steve says, gently as he can manage. He lowers his voice. Doesn’t want Hopper hearing this bit, for sure. “But you’re gonna be really sick if you don’t take them. You caught something last night, and. You’re gonna be okay, but, you _need_ these. You’ll feel worse if you don’t. You’ll _hurt_ someone if you don’t.”

“What the _fuck?_ What the fuck did you do to me?” he fucking snarls at Steve, leaning forward with his chest pushed against the edge of the table. Steve feels like he’s standing just out of reach from a guard dog on a short chain. Tantalizing it.

But Billy’s too weak to stand by himself. He can’t get up, or he would be up in Steve’s face right now.

“ _I’m_ not the one who--” but he cuts himself off. Billy’s not quite _there._ He can’t play a blame game with him right now. “Look, dude. You’re sick. Like Jonathan Byers. Remember?”

“Oh my God, _Dracula?_ ” And that nickname brings back bad memories. Steve invented it for him in seventh grade, and they would all laugh and laugh. It evidently stuck. “Harrington, I’m freakin’ the fuck out right now. I can’t remember anything that happened before I got busted and put in a fuckin’ _pig_ car, and I’m so _thirsty,_ and now you’re tellin’ me it’s ‘cause I got what Dracula’s got? I’m gonna fuckin’ _kill_ you, I swear to fuckin’ God--”

It’s a little hard to take his threat seriously when his wrists are cuffed together like that and he can’t get to his fucking feet.

Steve stands and crosses to the window, raps on it to get Hopper’s attention pantomiming drinking water out of a glass while Billy keeps demanding _where do you think you’re going, you little bitch, come back and fuckin’ face me._

When Hopper comes in with one of those measly paper cones full of water, Billy’s puffing and grunting, a ball of anger perched at the front of his chair. Hopper hands it to Steve and stands there menacing, until Billy gives in to the gaze and his own fucking weak body, and relaxes against the chair.

Billy tries to suppress a hiss when he touches it, like it _hurts._

“You want me to hold him still?” Hopper asks, but he’s already doing so, much to Billy’s dismay.

Billy’s tired himself out, though. Can’t do much to resist Hopper’s strength, pinning him there with both hands to Billy’s shoulders.

Steve nods and peppers one little red, round pill into his clammy palm. Billy’s breathing raggedly as Steve approaches him. His lids are fluttering and his eyes are glazed over, reminding Steve of a dying animal being put down.

It’s supposed to be one pill in the morning, one at night, but Billy’s missed the first one, so. Steve takes out a second pill, too. Speed things along, hopefully.

“I don’t wanna, please, Harrington, don’t make me,” he sobs. Hot, fresh tears well in his eyes and spill seconds later, fat over his dirty cheeks. And that’s new. In all the trauma Steve’s seen the guy go through, he’s never seen him actually cry. When Billy speaks next, it’s a hoarse whisper, and it’s _painful_ to Steve. “Harrington, _please._ Anything else, I’ll do anything, I’ll suck you off, _swear._ ”

“ _Kid,_ ” Hopper says, stern. “It’s okay. You’re doing great.”

And that last part’s possibly meant just as much for Steve as it is for Billy.

Steve won’t look Billy in the eye. Can’t. Billy’s so frail, he just lays his head back with his tongue flattened out, ready as he’ll ever be. He hates doctors. Hates medicine. And what’s going on inside him now, that only makes makes him more resistant, like the sickness knows it’s being repressed, when it wants to _rage._

Steve focuses on Hopper’s badge instead, inspecting the angles and the way it glints in the light as he presses the twin pills to the back of Billy’s tongue, feeling more like he’s peer pressuring him to do rave drugs than help him get better. Next he forces Billy to knock all the water back, despite how there are more tears rolling from his squeezed-shut eyes.

When he swallows, it’s labored, and he cringes with his entire body. Hopper holds him down through it.

Steve can’t help when he strokes his hand through Billy’s wet curls. “See? Easy. All done, you’re okay. You did so good.”

The pills won’t start to kick in fully for another twenty minutes, but for now, Billy’s relaxed a bit, shoulders going slack at Steve’s words.

When they’re sure Billy’s not trying to attack either of them any longer, Hopper unlocks the cuffs from his wrists. Billy stares blankly at his reflection in the window, looking pale and sickly, like he doesn’t even really _see_ himself. He rubs his wrists where he’s developed red chafing and raw cuts from trying to pull against his imprisonment. Laps his bleeding scrapes with his tongue.

And then, Billy just fucking _cries._ Lets his whole body loose and breaks down, sobbing noiselessly into his large hands, covering his face with them so the other men can’t see. His masculinity, so fucking _important_ to him. Like _that’s_ what’s at stake.

Hopper leaves the room. Steve looks away for him.

He knows he can’t bring Billy home like this. Can’t try to force him to the hospital.

So when Billy’s progressed to only vaguely grumbling that he’s _so fucking thirsty,_ Steve brings him out into the parking lot. Lets him breathe in the muggy night air. Billy can’t stop shaking, but at least he’s not fevered and hysterical like before.

They sit in the car with the windows rolled down, listening to the leaves blowing in the gentle wind.

“You wanna smoke?” Steve asks, offering up a joint from the center console. He hands Billy his lighter, the one that says _Leo_ on it, featuring an intricate little golden lion.

Billy accepts with trembling fingers. He sniffs back snot and wipes the back of his hand over his nostrils before sparking it up.

“Was starting to think you’d never ask.”


End file.
